Despite pandemic, prison life goes on pretty much as usual

While the world outside is in virtual lockdown, life inside the state prisons at Cottonwood and Orofino goes on day to day pretty much as usual.

There have been no reports of COVID-19 inside North Idaho Correctional Institution at Cottonwood or Idaho Correctional Institution at Orofino, wardens for both prisons said.

But all visitors and volunteers have been banned from entering the prisons, and staff members must be screened when they report for work every day.

“Initially, the precautions were to limit all access into the facility,” including family members of inmates, contractors, college tours and other nonessential traffic, said Terema Carlin, the warden at Orofino, which is a minimum- and medium-security prison that currently houses 598 inmates.

“We also have college classes inside our program from the University of Idaho and we moved to do that class online as well,” she said. “We were able to use programs like Zoom (an online teleconference platform) so the class is still going on, all over the internet.”

The same procedures are being followed at the retained jurisdiction prison at Cottonwood, where there are 426 inmates in custody.

“We’re taking a lot of steps with screening in different ways,” said Aaron Krieger, the warden at Cottonwood.

“We have a robust treatment staff ... and we haven’t stopped treatment or education programs,” Krieger said. This includes the GED program offered to inmates who have not completed their high school education, along with alcohol and substance abuse treatment and sex offender programs.

Keeping these programs in place is critical, Krieger said.

“Because it’s retained jurisdiction, these guys can’t cycle through the system unless we continue that,” he said. “The judges are relying on us to keep the system moving. We have to continue this as long as we can.”

When inmates are scheduled for court hearings or consultations with their attorneys, those take place over the phone. And when an inmate is released from custody, Krieger said the family is contacted to pick up the inmate, rather than have the state transport him.

Because the volunteers who often provide guidance for substance abuse programs and religious services can no longer enter the prison, Carlin said a staff member conducts those meetings.

“We typically don’t allow those to be inmate-led because we want them to be structured and not led down a path inappropriately,” Carlin said. “But it’s still important for them to attend (religious) services so our (staff coordinator) is doing that. We just check on them on a regular basis to make sure topics are on point.”

Some of the programs offered at the prisons include one called “Thinking for a Change,” as well as anger management, substance abuse and sex offender programs. Another activity involves several prisoners who have been sewing face masks to be donated to local hospitals.

“We want to try to maintain as much normalcy as possible, but also we’ve increased the amount of cleaning we’re doing,” Carlin said. “So every hour after a movement (of inmates from one location to another), we have a janitor that is cleaning handrails, door knobs, anything that could be a place where a virus could be, at least on the surface.”

Janitors at each housing unit are also doing more mopping and disinfecting places where inmates gather.

Although there have been no reports of illness, those inmates at both prisons who have compromised health have been moved into a separate housing unit away from the general population. They are allowed to eat and exercise at different times than the rest of the inmates.

Carlin said there have been no complaints from the inmates about the extra measures that are being taken.

“They’ve been really good about responding to the precautions we’ve put into place,” Carlin said.

Her main concern is a potential staff shortage if one of her workers becomes ill.

“So we are already on 12-hour shifts and we’ve developed a plan that would allow us to run on emergency staffing,” she said. That could include bringing administrative staff in to help run a housing unit.

“I believe that if we got to the point where we had to quarantine all housing units, we would stop all programs, and everybody would remain in their housing unit or go into the recreation yard and then we could utilize other staff options,” she said.

These alterations also have affected the jobs that the red-shirt crews from the prisons have been working on. Carlin said prison staff and the vendors who hire the red-shirt crews mutually agreed to suspend those outside operations until the pandemic has subsided.

“That has been a negative impact of not earning the income (from the crews), but we felt their safety was more important than the revenue,” Carlin said.

Some of the inmates’ biggest concerns have been their commissary allowances to pay for personal hygiene items, food and candy.

“The commissary is not being stopped; we’re still supplying their commissary orders,” Carlin said. “I hope that won’t be stopped. That’s important for them to have and we have increased the amount they can purchase each week. We’re telling them we understand their concerns.”

Hedberg may be contacted at kathyhedberg@gmail.com or (208) 983-2326.